According to forecasts by the Federal Office of Energy (FOE) and the energy industry, electricity deficits can be expected in the near future. With this in mind, and for climate protection and energy security reasons, the Federal Council's energy strategy is in favour of building gas-fired combined-cycle power plants only as a transitional solution.

Investments in building new plants are being impeded at the political level due to the obligation to fully compensate for CO2 emissions in Switzerland. Politicians have the means to create boundary conditions that enable the operation of gas-fired combined-cycle power plants according to economic criteria. But because such boundary conditions do not exist at present, various projects within the energy sector have been shelved. Whether or not they can be realised depends heavily on the introduction of boundary conditions which can compete with those in place throughout Europe.

Gas-fired combined-cycle power plants process natural gas in two stages: The residual heat from combustion is used to drive a steam turbine. Combining both stages increases the plant's efficiency to around 58 percent, compared to 40 percent for traditional gas-fired power plants.